When things go bad in life

I read two interesting stories yesterday, from an email and a blog. Both about how when bad things happen to us in our lives, they may actually be good.

When your hut's on fire:

The only survivor of a shipwreck was washed up on a small, uninhabited island. He prayed feverishly for God to rescue him. Every day he scanned the horizon for help, but none seemed forthcoming. Exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to protect him from the elements, and to store his few possession! s. One day, after scavenging for food, he arrived home to find his little hut in flames, with smoke rolling up to the sky. He felt the worst had happened, and everything was lost. He was stunned with disbelief, grief, and anger. He cried out, 'God! How could you do this to me?' Early the next day, he was awakened by the sound of a ship approaching the island! It had come to rescue him! 'How did you know I was here?' asked the weary man of his rescuers. 'We saw your smoke signal,' they replied.

The Moral of This Story:
It's easy to get discouraged when things are going bad, but we shouldn't lose heart, because God is at work in our lives, even in the midst of our pain and suffering. Remember that the next time your little hut seems to be burning to the ground. It just may be a smoke signal that summons the Grace of God!

Good, it is Good!

Once upon a time, there lived a tribal king who loved to hunt. Whenever he went on his hunting trips, he would bring along his able tribesman, who was very good at navigating the forests for game.

One day, while the tribesman was loading the rifle, he accidentally pulled the trigger, and he shot at the tribal king’s last finger. Upon seeing what he had done, the tribesman said, “Good, it is good!”

Furious and in pain, the tribal king threw the tribesman into prison, banishing him from his future hunting trips. But the tribesman said again, “Good, it is good!” The tribal king could not understand why he said that, and ignored him.

After recovering from his injured finger, the tribal king went on his hunting trip.
This time, he went alone. Because he was unfamiliar with the territory, he treaded on forbidden grounds and was captured by another tribe. This tribe was a carnivorous tribe…so you can kinda guess what’s going to happen from here…

The tribes people started preparing a cauldron of broth, ready to cook their new found “food”. While they were inspecting the tribal king, they found that he was short of a finger!

Now, these tribes people had a superstition…they cannot eat any human being who’s not complete. Disgusted and disappointed, they released the tribal king.

Upon his release, the tribal king ran back home gleefully to look for his tribesman locked up in prison. “Good, it is good! Now, I finally realize why you said that! My life was spared because of the accident!”

The tribal king released him at once, and apologized profusely for locking him up. The tribesman told him, “No, no, don’t have to apologise! Good, it is good that I was locked up! Cos if I went on the hunting trip with you…guess who would be eaten instead?”

I have previously posted another story also along this line about how good luck and bad luck.

So next time something bad happens. Look on the bright side of life, it could be a blessing in disguise.

Vocation Discernment and Kampung Punggol

A bit of advertisment here.
There are two vocation discernment events that are being organised these two months.

First would be the Vocation Discernment Tools Workshop.
In response to the question of "How do we discern God's call?" that many young people are asking today. The Seminary and Serra Club are organising this workshop for young people who are discerning, those working with young people, or vocation promotion teams.

This Workshop is open to everyone of all ages and gender. You can register with the Serra Club at this website

The Second Event would be the Vocation Discernment Retreat in May
This Retreat is for young men over the age of 17, who would like to find out more about the priesthood, and to discern if God is calling them to the priestly vocation.

You can register for this through the priest of your parish, or email to seminariansonline@gmail.com

The Seminary also has a new website at www.sfxms.org.sg. Actually its been up for quite a while, just that I've never blogged about it. We are still trying to improve certain parts of it, especially the photo gallery. So if anyone has suggestions, feel free to email them to seminariansonline@gmail.com

And Lastly the Singapore Seminarians have come up with a blog, to share our life and reflections in this ulu part of Singapore that we affectionately call Kampung Punggol. So do give it a visit. The links are on the right side of this blog.

Feast Day

For nearly 30 years of my life, I have been living under the impression that there was no Saint by the name of Terence, I find out, with the help of the mighty GOOGLE that there indeed is a St Terence, in fact a few, depending on which source. Don't know if the Vatican website has a complete list of all the Saints of the Church.

Anyway I found on the Catholic.org list of Saints and the Patron Saints Index a few St Terences. One who I'm going to take as my Patron Saint, was one of a group of 50 Christians who were imprisoned in a pen of snakes and scorpions, and then martyred.

I chose him as his feast day occurs quite close to the date on which I got that mysterious call, that has led me down this path of my vocation. So now he has got to pray for me and my vocation. Too bad not much is known about him to write about.

Have a few more posts still on my PDA to blog, just haven't had the time to complete them... Really procrastinating a lot.